Petalumans celebrate the right to read
It’s September, which means schools are in session, paper and pens are selling at a higher rate than during the summer, and National Banned Books Week is about to be celebrated.
“Simply put,” says Ray Lawrason, assistant manager of Petaluma’s Copperfield’s Book Store, “a banned book is a book that someone doesn’t want you to read. And National Banned Books Week is a way of saying, not on our watch.”
Lawrason is standing within a few feet of a small, tidy, display - part of the store’s annual observation Banned Books Week, Sept. 23-29 - over which hangs a placard saying, “Celebrate your right to read.” Elsewhere is a smaller sign declaring, “Banning books silences stories. Speak Out!” The display features rows of books, all of which have been challenged and banned in the past, for one reason or another – S. E. Hinton’s “The Outsiders,” Margaret Atwood’s “The Handmaid’s Tale,” Allen Ginsburg’s “Howl,” “Harper Lee’s “To Kill a Mockingbird,” J.K. Rowling’s “Harry Potter” books, Toni Morrison’s “Beloved,” and several others.
“By definition, a banned book is a book that has been actively challenged and removed from course curriculum and schools, or from public libraries, or in some cases, made unlawful by governments and forbidden to be sold in bookstores,” Lawrason says. “All of those – schools, libraries, bookstores – they are places where you would and should expect to have a complete access to all reading material. Banned Books Week, which I personally love, was created to call attention to the fact that there will always be people trying to control the ideas you are allowed to consider - and to remind us that it’s easier than we might assume to lose the right to think, and to read, for ourselves.”
Banned Books Week – promoted jointly by the American Library Association and Amnesty International - was first observed in 1982. The annual observation was co-created by librarian-activist Judith Krug, who served as Director of the Office of Intellectual Freedom at the American Library Association. Aware that a large number of books had been banned in the U.S. that year, Krug set out to let readers know their First Amendment rights were being gradually eroded by those who sought to remove titles from schools and libraries, purportedly as a way of protecting children from ideas, language, situation and historical details they might find upsetting, or that might differ from the viewpoints of their parents.
Said Krug to the New York Times, in 1997, “We want to provide as much information as we can, and say to our users, ‘It is all here. You make the choice. You should have access to ideas and information regardless of your age.’ If anyone is going to limit or guide a young person, it should be the parent or guardian - and only the parent or guardian.”
In the U.S., Banned Books Week is supported by a number of organizations, including the American Booksellers Association, the American Booksellers Foundation for Free Expression, the American Society of Journalists and Authors, the Association of American Publishers, and the National Association of College Stores.
“Generally, when we’re talking about banned books, there’s been some sort of governmental ban on a book, from a school board or other organization,” explains Ross Lockhart, a bookseller at Copperfield’s Petaluma, and the owner and publisher of Word Horde Books, a Petaluma-based publishing company devoted to “weird fiction,” works of horror, science fiction and fantasy. “A ban is not something as simple as a vegetarian book store choosing to not carry a book of barbecued beef recipes. A merchant has the right to sell what they want to sell, and not sell what they don’t want to sell. That’s not a ban. A ban is when a parent or local group throws a fit about a book, and wants to forbid people - either kids or adults depending on the situation - from ever reading that book or encountering those ideas.”
In this day and age, Lockhart points out, we see fewer of the classic book burning events that once made the nightly news. Instead, he says, we are seeing quiet political campaigns to challenge a library or school’s decision to carry a particular book.
“And when you start to look at facts and figures,” he says, “it’s interesting to note that female authors, LGBT authors, and authors of color, all tend to have their books challenged more than anybody else. It’s definitely the case that most challenges come from small political or religious groups that feel threatened, and want to exert some control over what people can and cannot read, but minority authors tend to draw more challenges than all others.”
Diana Spaulding, a librarian at the Petaluma Regional Library, agrees.
“Minority viewpoints are often challenged,” she says. “A feminist story or a story about an LGBT teen, is more likely to draw fire than a book about something else, told from a more mainstream perspective. I fully expect the new “Trans Teen Survival Guide” to be challenged somewhere.”
According to Spaulding, the Petaluma Library, just in time for Banned Books Week, has recently received a list of those books that were challenged or banned in 2017 and early 2018.
Echoing the above quote from Judith Krug, Spaulding adds, “The American Library Association’s response to all book challenges is that libraries provide information, and from that pool of information people choose the info they want to read and view. If you have an opinion, you are welcome to make it, obviously. But you should never inhibit the free flow of information to everyone else.”
(Send comments to Community Editor David Templeton at david.templeton@arguscourier.com)
UPDATED: Please read and follow our commenting policy: